Blog Content Writer Senders – Come With Your Sendees!

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When things aren’t going right in business, the natural tendency is to point fingers away from oneself – whatever’s wrong, it’s the fault of that guy or gal over there, that other department, or that other manager.” says Bill Jeffries, President & CEO of Executive Strategies International.

 

That’s why, in working with employees to develop high-performing teams, Jeffries insists the “senders”, (aka the blamers) come along to the sessions with their “send-ees”. Similarly, in the Israeli Defense Forces, an officer is always expected to lead from the front. The famous cry of the officer is "aharai!" (follow me).

Does all this have anything to do with providing business blogging assistance? I really think so. It doesn’t matter, in my book, whether business owners or professional practitioners are doing their own blog posting or hiring professional ghost bloggers like me to help. The blog’s message might be well-thought out, or it might even be unintentional. Either way, wherever there’s a blog, that blog is conveying the values and beliefs of the owners.  You might say blog content writing is one way of inviting online readers to “come on in” and become part of the process of bringing those values to life.

The business owner offering advice through blogging for business is, in a way, the sender. (He or she’s giving advice, issuing Calls to Action, and “driving” traffic to the website, basically assuming a leadership role.  The online reader searching for information, products, and services is the send-ee in the typical corporate blog writing scenario.

Thing is, the cry of the blogger had better be “aharai!” (the cry of leading from the front), not the cry of either salesperson or movie director. In a blog offering information about health products or services, it needs to be obvious the content writer is a believer in and user of those very products and services. What reader can be engaged in advice about stock trading when the advisor has all her money in CD’s? In corporate blogging training sessions, I stress sincerity and passion over facts and figures when it comes to SEO marketing blogs.

Freelance blog writers in Indianapolis – how many ways can you say “Follow me!”?

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Press Release Cautions for Business Blog Writing

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Blog content writers can take a tip from friend and fellow blogger Susan Young of Aimfire Marketing. When we’re delivering information to online visitors through blog content writing, we should pay attention to three of the cautions Young issues about sending press releases.
 

  • Include the most important information up front, (so the reporter/producer knows the overview of the story before going into the details).

Remember, the reason online searcher find your SEO marketing blog site in the first place is that what you provide matched up with whatever need or want those searchers typed into the search bar! Those readers need confirmation that they’ve come to exactly the right place to fulfill their needs and wishes – and they need to know that right off the bat!
 

  • Stick to the main idea; don’t include too much information in your release or pitch.

When it comes to business blog writing, I explain to business owners for whom I'm providing blog writing services, minimalism means focus.  Presenting, then illustrating, a single concept, leaving the rest for another day, is the very essence of effective blog post creation.
 

  • Research your targeted publications to ensure they’re a good fit for your story.


To be an effective marketing tool for your business, your blog must to be the result of a well-planned strategy aimed at a specific segment of the market.  Never try to appeal to  everybody – talk to the ones most likely to be reading what you have to say.

Breaking media etiquette rules may get your pitch deleted or ignored, Young points out.  As all good freelance blog content writers know, failing to engage online visitors upfront, including too many ideas in one blog post, and not knowing your audience’s needs will get you “bounced” in a big way!

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Business Blog Writing About Never and Always

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Stopped at a light on my way to provide business blogging help to a Say It For You client, I had just enough time to read some rather arresting billboard content.  This health service provider’s “ad” was really a mission statement.  IU Health pledged:

  • To be driven by excellence
     
  • To handle any challenge
     
  • To never slow down
     
  • To always stay in front

That billboard, I realized, illustrates a truth that everyone doing business blog writing –  and everyone providing business blogging assistance, needs to keep in mind:  The way I state that truth is “Your brand ‘r you in your blog”.

What I mean is that blog content writing is about a whole lot more than what you do, what you know, and the stuff or services you sell. It’s really about who you are, and about what you pledge – to yourself, and to the clients and customers you serve.

In fact, as an important part of my process in clarifying the message that a business owner or professional practitioners wants to convey through blog content writing, I challenge each of them to answer the following question:

If you had only eight to ten words to describe why you’re passionate
about what you do, what would those words be?

Having seen that IU Health billboard, I realize there’s another way to provoke the sort of introspection that gives rise to compelling, highly personal blog content writing – a sort of fill-in-the-pledge exercise:

  • By what are you driven?
     
  • Why must you never slow down in your quest for excellence in what you do?
     
  • Why, in your field, is it important to “stay in front”?

And, whether a business owner or practitioner is doing the blog writing or collaborating with a professional ghost blogger partner such as Say It For You, the blog is an embodiment of a brand – and of a mission!

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Fire and Jello in Your Business Blog

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An “ice page”, I learned, is a web page on which the primary content has a fixed width, usually set to the left side of the window. (More flexible settings are called “jello” or “liquid”.)

Interesting. Since I train blog content writers in Indianapolis, I immediately realized that “ice” in blog writing can be a time-saving device.  After all, the primary excuse business owners use to explain why their corporate blogs have fallen into a state of disrepair (or been outright abandoned) is lack of time.

While up until a few days ago I wasn’t familiar with the term “ice page”, I am familiar with the general concept.  In fact, when company owners or professional practitioners (or the professional ghost bloggers they’ve employed to help them) express doubts about their ability to keep generating new blog content over extended periods of time, I have been introducing them to an “ice” concept which I call the leitmotif.

Effective blog posts for any company, professional practice, or organization can be planned around key themes.  (Leitmotifs are the recurring musical phrases that connect the different movements of a symphony, for example.) Those themes, like “ice pages”, are fixed ideas that form the basis for blog posts.  But around those pieces of “ice”, blogging for business means filling in new details, examples, and illustrations (the “jello” and “liquid” elements that bring variety and freshness to individual posts).

That’s why, at Say It For You corporate blogging training sessions, our discussions are not about ways to continually find brand-new ideas, but on building “e.g.’s” and i.e.’s around the business’ or the practice’s core themes.

A teacher for many years, I know that every lesson needs to be offered in a variety of formats, because students have different learning styles.  Blog writing services need to incorporate the same principle – the basic messages remain the same, but since online readers have different tastes and needs and learning styles, SEO marketing blogs must offer a variety of styles and material. 

With well-defined “ice” content as the core around which that “jello” is created, that otherwise formidable task becomes a whole lot easier for blog content writers!

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Using Company Manners in Your Company Business Blog

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“We use our inside voices at school,” I overheard one kindergarten teacher saying in a well-modulated tone, in sharp contrast to her students’ shouts.

Blogger Daniel Scocco (“Skellie”) offers similar advice in “10 Principles of Successful Business Blogging”: “When you take a business-related call with a client….do you use slang, swear, or are you otherwise impolite?” he asks, reminding us blog content writers to think of our writing as an extension of our professional “voice”.

Two more Skellie principles relate to bloggers in terms of use of company manners as well:

 

  • Be personal (that helps establish you has someone clients can relate to)
     
  • But don’t be too personal, he cautions, getting into family matters, relationships, stresses, etc.  In other words keep your tone positive, minding those “company manners”.

In Say It For You corporate blogging training sessions, I recommend just that sort of “high road” approach to business blog content writing. Yet, while Skellie tells bloggers to “keep politics, morality, and controversy out of your business blogging”, I encourage business owners and professional practitioners to use their business blog to reveal their core values and corporate culture.  That may mean coming down strongly on one side of an issue, to be sure. Fact is, people want to do business with real people who have real passion concerning their work. 

Think of the most highly skilled corporate blogging for business  as truth-telling with an “inside voice”!

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